Week 21: More Miracles and More Shenanigans :)

This week started out GREAT! We had lots of lessons planned and we taught a lot of new people and we ended the week with 5 NEW INVESTIGATORS!!!! Unheard of in these parts of the woods {literally}! It was so cool! We are now teaching 4 families WHAT A BLESSING!!! It's been cool to see how the first 2 transfers we seriously had like 1 person to teach but these last 2 transfers have exploded and we've been finding people like crazy! I hope they continue to take the discussions we are meeting with all of them again this week :) YAY!  Wednesday was the Worldwide Missionary Broadcast! IT WAS SO GOOD! It was cool to hear Apostles like Elder Bednar, Elder Oaks, and Elder Andersen address just the missionaries. I took like 6 pages of notes! One of my favorite parts is when one of the Apostles said he considers himself equal with the missionaries in spreading the gospel and trying to follow Jesus Christ...I was like WOW!!!! It was a great broadcast and I think it really helped missionaries to focus on teaching repentance and baptizing converts...not just baptizing to be in the newsletter or to get the numbers. It was really good! This week we have been doing something super cool in most of our lessons!!! In Chapter 5 of Preach My Gospel {should be everyone's Family Home Evening Manual by the way :)} it talks about how the Book of Mormon answers the Questions of the Soul. We've been going to appointments and as a group picking a question of the soul and then opening up to a random chapter in the Book of Mormon and then reading it and trying to get the answer to our question. IT'S BEEN SO LEGIT!!! I, of little faith, get nervous every time that we'll open up to a war chapter and we'll be trying to answer how do we gain happiness in this life? hahaha but every time we have been able to answer our questions. I think it's an excellent way to study the Book of Mormon. 

Here's how to do it: 

1) Before you study just think of a question you have 

2) Then after reading that chapter try to apply it to your life and see how it connects. 

Heavenly Father answers our prayers not just through thoughts and feelings but through the scriptures as well. I think the scriptures are one thing that are hard for people sometimes. We slack off and we don't read...just pray occasionally or something...but we can get super awesome personal revelation from just reading a verse or a chapter a day. I'VE SEEN IT!!! I promise that reading your scriptures will help you answer those questions you have and bring a ton more blessings as well!  Saturday we were trying hard to set something up so we wouldn't have to knock doors all day, but we weren't having much luck! Then in the middle of lunch we get a call from an investigator Doug and he said he wanted to meet up! SWEET!!! We scheduled it for that day!!! It seriously amazes me how the miracles just roll in when you're in a tough spot. Sunday was SO GOOD!!! Our investigators didn't come to church and for the first time ieeks we sat ALL ALONE!! It was really weird! But that might be a good thing because we had a super awkward moment in sacrament meeting! LOL So up here they tend to sing all the verses because the meetings run short and the songs just sound better when you sing all the verses...well out of my whole 5 months being here I didn't know that...so we are singing the intermediate hymn and after the last verse Sister Christensen and I sit down....well everyone keeps singing and is still standing...and staring at us!!! OH THE EMBARRASSMENT!!!!!!!!! We always sit right in the front too so ALL 40 PEOPLE SAW US!!! I couldn't stop laughing...you could hear people laughing amidst the singing and it was just great haha. Even Bishop couldn't hold his tune! Uh...anyway we had to sit through 2 MORE AGONIZING VERSES...we got in trouble for not watching the chorister...hahaha In Sunday School the teacher brought up a really neat "idea" or "concept". We talked about the Great and Spacious building and Lehi's vision and how everyone has super nice things  (and according to my dad's Sunday school lesson many years ago they all have helicopter pads too :)) So all these prideful people are standing on their fancy balconies leaning over and scoffing at the people trying to hold to the rod and reach the tree and partake of the fruit (see 1 Nephi 8) and then...{this is the cool part guys}....the teacher said BEHIND THEM THE MISSIONARIES ARE KNOCKING AT THEIR DOOR.....HOLY SMOKES... Just try to envision that...super cool right?!? I want a painting of that...one side Lehi's vision...and on the other side the missionaries! I never thought of it like that before and I LOVE IT!  We had a super good week :) Before I wasn't really sure why I was staying here another transfer...but I'm starting to see lots of miracles come from it and people are starting to come out of the woodwork and it's cool that I get to be apart of it!

Funny Moments from this week:

We were tracting and we kept getting super lame excuses for not wanting to talk to us...but this excuse was....well....you decide... We were knocking at this door and there was no answer but we could hear this little girl saying there's someone at the door to her mom/dad. As we were about to put the card in the door it opened...this guy was like What do you want? We said who we were and he was like well it's not a good time I was just in the middle of going to the bathroom....WHY DID YOU EVEN OPEN THE DOOR!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh my goodness we were DYING laughing for a long time TMI man....you meet the strangest people and experience the weirdest things on your mission. 

Cool Stories from this week:

So I recently found out from my super awesome Family History Loving Mother that I have a lot of relatives that served IN THIS MISSION! One of them baptized one of the first members in a town just south of here! I'm on the hunt to talk to all the old people in this community to figure out some more information! Apparently there are Gillingwaters (mom's side) in my mission area as well so I'm going to look through all the phone books!! haha Should be fun :)

Things are going really good!

Thank you for all the prayers and emails :)

I really like hearing from everyone!

Hope you all have a good week!

Love,

Sister Peterson